Wolverine #10: Two Months To Die Comic Book Review
By Roger Lee
Wolverine #10: Two Months To Die
Wolverine: Two Months To Die Cover
The lingering Wolverine-is-dying-soon storyline continues with Wolverine #10. In our review of this comic book, we dissect problems with the writing and the whole question of where this storyline fits into the rest of the Marvel Universe continuity, while also taking a look at the questionable art-work of this book.
Writer Paul Cornell does not understand Logan. That is this reviewer’s opinion. In the opening scene, Logan shows up at the door of the Jean Grey School for Higher Learning (someday ALL the old X-Men will have a school named for them!), and announces to the young mutant who answers the door, “We got trouble kid. Go wake Henry.” Now, I have been reading stories featuring Wolverine as an X-Man since Giant-Sized X-Men #1 in 1975. I think I am familiar with how Logan speaks. It took me a second to figure out “Henry” was Hank McCoy. Logan never calls Beast by his real first name. And he repeats it in conversation with Beast later. Sorry, but Logan would call his old friend “Hank”, not “Henry.” Fail number one.
Wolverine: Two Months To Die Panel-Logan at the door.
Fail number two: No exposition by the writer/narrator. One of the great aspects to the old Marvel writers and editors (Stan Lee, Roy Thomas, etc.) was that they would insert little text boxes throughout their comics to keep occasional readers in the know. As in, when Wolverine walks into a bar and it is full of people he knows, (but they are not A-list Marvel characters that, duh, everyone knows), to inform the reader that, oh, these are Logan’s old buddies, X, Y, Z, and Z-23, and so on. This book? Nada. The casual reader is left to be confused as to who the players are.
I confess that I am not a huge fan of Wolverine. I do not recognize the folks at this bar he seems to frequent. I like him as an X-Man. It made sense to put him into the New Avengers a few years back. But he has been overexposed over the years in the comics. Like now. Marvel is clearly trying to make money off of the attention the non-comic reading public now has toward Wolvie and the X-Men following the success of the latest X-Movie (which Marvel does not control). But this is not the way to do it.
Fail number three: Continuity. What is Logan doing chasing down Sabretooth (oh, yeah, that is part of this confusing little plot as well), when he is clearly involved in the Original Sin crossover event that has most of the rest of the Marvel Universe in a tizzy right now? One would assume that the two stories are occurring at roughly the same time in “Marvel Time,” right? The end of this book has Logan joined by Thor, the unnamed barflies, Nick Fury, Jr., and a passel of SHIELD agents. Um… isn’t Thor heavily involved in Original Sin to the point that he and his brother Loki are off in some Tenth Realm looking for their long-lost sister? What the heck is he doing in New York? And how does Thor have time to help Logan right now? None of this makes sense.
Fail number four: The writer seems to not know anything about Logan’s past. As Wolverine puts his claws through some evil ninja types (who were attacking the bar at Sabretooth’s behest), Logan makes a comment along the lines of “Now that I can’t heal, I won’t play by the Avengers’ and X-Men’s rules.” Implying that when he was basically immortal, he did not use his claws to kill, but now he has no choice. What garbage! Wolverine has killed copious amounts of ninjas, henchmen, enemy soldiers, Hydra agents, AIM agents, and other evil ilk for decades. Now, he is saying the gloves are off and he has to kill? Paul Cornell has no clue about who or what Logan is and has been in the past. Does Marvel no longer have editors who check on their employees’ work before it gets published?
The art in this book is also a concern. Artist Pete Woods may have been in a hurry. Or he is a bad artist. I don’t know. For example, in one panel, Storm is pointing at Logan angrily. Her nose does not look right. On other panels and other pages, Storm looks more like Storm. With the right nose. On the same page with the Storm nose issue, we see two panels with Logan’s face. In the first panel, his scar/facial wound (remember, he now has no healing factor), is livid and red above his eye, and a dark line below the eye. The next panel, the entire scar is bright red. What gives? Is the artist even paying attention?
Wolverine: Two Months To Die Panel-Storm and Logan
I only picked up this issue and the previous issue, Wolverine #9, out of curiosity over this latest “Kill an iconic character” event. Everyone knows Logan will come back. This is just another gimmick to drive up sales and maybe get back at Fox for making pretty good X-Men films. Marvel has killed off other characters temporarily, such as the death of Captain America in 2007, but that and other stories at least had the benefit of being well-written and actually tying into what was happening in the rest of the Marvel Universe. Unless you are a fanatic about Wolverine or you just want to see the guy get killed off, avoid this series. It is neither written well, nor is the art worth looking at.
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